Family
by TheMarauder1967
Summary: Sirius Black on what it means to have a family.


_Do you know_

 _how often_

 _I speak to you_

 _when you are not  
here? _

_How often_

 _I_

 _Mouth words and phrases_

 _To the space you should be filling?_

 _(Tyler Knot Gregson)_

It's easier to write about love, than it is to write about pain.

It's easier to express the words and describe the person because everyone has seen something beautiful, and there's certain phrases that you can use to explain something, and even though you can never quite explain it _right,_ it's enough for the reader to get the idea.

Writing about pain is a lot harder. No matter how hard you try, you can never capture the essence of what it is. You can't explain a situation because it doesn't feel like it's enough. No matter how much pain you go through, you can never explain it to someone else because they will never understand.

They're just words, in the end. Just letters and syllables and capital letters that cannot explain how _shit_ it is to lose someone.

People only believe in pain if they can see it.

Sirius Black stands outside the only home he's ever known and watches it crumble.

He watches is collapse into ash and dust, but when it all clears and he can see again, it's still standing. It's still standing because nothing has been destroyed but him.

His palms are sweaty and his heart is beating in his chest and _fuck Peter._ Just _fuck_ him.

Anger, too, is difficult to express.

This one is clenched hands and frustration so huge that there are tears in his eyes, but he's only angry because he's so _sad._ It's extreme and it controls everything. It's everywhere, in his veins in his eyes and in his brain and it's so bad it physically hurts.

It feels like someone has ripped a piece of him away and thrown it to someone else. Thrown it just out of reach, but too, too far away.

 _I'm James. James Potter._

 _Black, Sirius Black._

So, no. We won't do pain, we'll do love.

Brotherhood.

What it feels like to have a family.

Sirius Black had a family until he was eleven years old. They were harsh, yes, and believed in being brought up 'the proper way', with ball dancing lessons and calligraphy sets and posh china that only came out at Christmas and birthdays. There was a family tree in one of the rooms and Sirius loved it. He loved running his hands over the spaces on the tree and pointing out all the aunts and uncles he knows and loves.

When Regulus is old enough, Sirius shows him the words _Regulus Black_ on the tree, where they're right next to his own name. Sirius teaches him to play fight, and how to pretend that there's an army chasing them and it's down to them to save the world. Their mother watches, and she never smiles but it's okay because she loves them.

He has _Slytherin Slytherin Slytherin_ drilled into him from the moment he's old enough to understand what school is, and he doesn't even question that that's where he'll go.

When he's eleven years old, he meets James Potter.

James Potter comes from a family where his mum always smiles, and hugs him tight and his dad claps him on the shoulder and calls him _son._ James Potter believes in magic in a way that Sirius Black never did. He believes in it like it can change the world, and Sirius sees it merely as a thing that's _there._

James Potter holds his hand out like his father taught him and Sirius Black eyes it suspiciously like his father taught him. They sit next to each other on the train and both ignore their parent's warnings about the 'other kind' of magic. James Potter talks a mile a minute about his quidditch team and Sirius Black begins to join in.

The word _Gryffindor_ shocks him to the core.

It's a loud, violent tremor, and he gets the howler the next day. It screams at him and he nearly cries at the table during breakfast, but James is there, and so are Remus and Peter and he doesn't want to make them hate him on his very first day.

So, yeah. When he's eleven he loses a family.

He loses a brother who laughs at his jokes and a mother that teaches him new things, and a father than answers his questions about the world. His family hadn't been perfect, by any means, but they were _his,_ and he knew they loved him in their own special way.

He goes home for the Christmas holiday, and Regulus whispers to him that he did something wrong, but Regulus hasn't been told what because he's _too young to understand._ The day before he goes back to school, his mother worries more about the broken mirror that she just threw at her son than the shard of glass sticking out the back of his hand.

Sirius doesn't go home for Easter.

Instead, he turns to his new friends and focuses on being funny and loud, loud, loud and nobody but the three boys who share his dormitory with him even question that Sirius Black hasn't always been a shit that gets into too much trouble.

Remus vanishes frequently- his mother is ill, he says- and Sirius _hopes_ that maybe he's not the only one with the shit family, just so he knows he won't be alone. He doesn't say that, and instead high fives Lily Evans whenever she puts her hand up in class just to see her glare.

He learns how to fly properly, and him and James sneak down to the Quidditch Pitch every chance they can to nick a broom and fly around for an hour. He spends his time running through corridors and he doesn't think about his family until its half past two in the morning and he can't sleep because Remus is snoring, and Peter moves too much in his sleep so the sheets ruffle. So he throws a pillow at James and James listens as Sirius tells him about his family.

It's three o'clock in the morning and its nearly July, and soon Sirius will be getting back on the train to take him home to three people who hate him, but it doesn't seem so bad because James is there.

James with his dark, ruffled hair and glasses that are still slightly too big so they keep sliding down his nose, but he refuses to let Remus try to size them down a little bit because he's so stubborn. James who looks so much like Sirius they could be brothers.

Sirius goes back to Grimmauld place for the holidays, and his mother complains that he's beginning to turn into _one of them_ when he shifts uncomfortably when she says _mudblood._ He tries telling her about Lily Evans, the cleverest girl in their year, but she doesn't listen. She glares and glares and glares.

He still plays with Regulus, and Regulus laughs and tells him he'll hex him if he ever catches him, and Sirius' heart stops in his throat and he doesn't know _why._ Regulus laughs and Sirius, not for the first time, feels at home in an empty house with too much fancy furniture.

Sirius Black returns to Hogwarts and, almost immediately, things go to shit. He's twelve, now, and they're not the bottom of the school. By some fluke, both him and James manage to get onto the quidditch team, and they're the two youngest players by far but they work well together and nobody can question it.

Two months in, and he finds out that Remus is a werewolf and his whole perspective changes. He's grown up knowing that muggleborns are mudbloods and werewolves are bad, but it's not true.

Mary and Lily are both muggleborn, and they laugh and joke, and stress over homework the same as he does. And suddenly, Remus, the nicest one out of them all, is something that is supposed to be so evil that even his parents wouldn't touch it with a stick. _Remus._ Remus who folds his socks, and Remus who _always, always_ loses at Snap, and Remus who hates Pumpkin juice, but always has chocolate to hand and Remus who laughs whenever Sirius makes a joke about his name.

Remus who is the nicest person Sirius has ever met.

So he makes a vow. It takes him a week to come to terms with it, a week for him to realise that Remus has been Remus for the past year and he hasn't done anything to any of them. A week for him to realise that literally nothing has changed but Remus now trusts them a little bit more.

He makes a vow that Remus won't go through with it alone. So him, James and Peter slowly begin to make the transformation to Animagi.

James starts to ask Lily Evans out, and there's some slimeball called _Snape_ that follows her around. James hates him on principal because he's in Slytherin and Sirius doesn't think about how different his life would have been if he'd have been sorted in there too.

Him and James turn the fourth floor corridor into a forest, and get detention for a month. James cracks out these mirrors that let them see each other when they're not together and separate detentions aren't so boring any more. They figure out how to get into the kitchens, and James draws a rough sort of map so Peter doesn't get lost like he still manages to do.

Sirius has to go home for Christmas, and he ends up leaving half way through Christmas day and wandering around London. The streets are empty, and it's so quiet that Sirius has to scream. He stands in the middle of St. James' park at two o'clock on Christmas day, shivering from how cold it is and just screams.

James got a new broomstick for Christmas, and Sirius got a scar down his left arm from where his mother gestured too violently with her knife. Regulus tried to patch him up, but what good can a ten year old do?

Peter has a new radio, and Remus got a record from some Muggle band named _Queen,_ and Sirius falls in love with them. He gets an older student to bewitch Peter's radio to turn on to whatever station is playing Queen. They all get fed up with it after a couple of nights in which it spends the entire evening jumping from station to station playing the same song. James casts a shoddy _mufliato_ spell and it's quiet for a while.

Before he boards the Hogwarts express to go home for the summer, he looks back at Hogwarts and sighs. _He's not going home,_ he thinks, looking round at the three boys on either side of him, _not really._

Third year starts in the worst way possible.

He knew the sorting hat would scream _Slytherin_ when Regulus put it on his head, but it hesitated and that is a comfort, albeit a minor one. The Slytherin house shout and cheer as Regulus walks over, and Regulus doesn't look for Sirius before sitting in between Lucius Malfoy and Snivellus.

James claps him on the shoulder and mutters a _sorry, mate,_ and Remus offers him a sympathetic smile. Peter lets out a soft sigh of disappointment, and passes Sirius the sausages to try and distract him.

Third year, they spend a month with leaves in their mouths and Sirius knows McGonagall has figured out what they're doing, but she doesn't say anything.

He starts coming up with outrageous excuses for why Remus is constantly away, and before long, James joins in. They tell people that he's a secret warlock, a muggle on a mission, and an alien. The long scar the back of his leg is from when he fought off the giants in the Giants War that they learnt about in History of Magic. Remus tells them he's more surprised that they pay attention in history than he is that they've started coming up with excuses.

Sirius learns how to juggle, and he learns how to jinx. He casts a trip jinx on Snivellus and watches him almost fall into his potion. He bewitches the Slytherin benches to move every time someone tries to sit down on them, and he and James discover another secret passageway.

They come up with the idea of starting a map of the whole of Hogwarts, and Remus reluctantly agrees to join in. Peter claps with delight at the idea- he is, after all, always getting lost, and so they begin.

In between detentions and winning the quidditch cup, they create a map that has a basic outline of Hogwarts on it.

Sirius spends all the major holidays at school with Remus, but he's forced to go home for the summer. They all congregate at James' most days and his mum makes them a cake the shape of a Quaffle and they play two-a-side Quidditch until the sun goes down. Sirius stays the night, and he's woken the following morning by the sound of laughter coming from the kitchen.

James' mum hits him with the back of a spoon for going too close to the already-cooked pancakes, laughing as she swats him away. He feels like an insider, watching them. James' classes are askew and his hair is messier than Sirius has ever seen it, but he's also happier than Sirius has ever seen him.

Sirius has never forgotten seeing them laughing together, because he remembers racking his brains trying to figure out when he laughed like that with his mum, and he _can't._ James' dad claps him on the shoulders and calls him _son,_ and Sirius begins to feel like he's slowly rebuilding his family.

Fourth year isn't eventful. He spends it avoiding Regulus' eye contact in the great feast and getting in to far too much trouble with James.

He has his first kiss under the stairs on the way up to the divination room. Some blonde girl named _Stella,_ who talks with an Irish accent and batters her eyelashes when she talks. Its fourth year when Sirius discovers girls might be a thing he's interested in.

The next Hogsmeade trip, he has a date and it becomes a _thing._ Sirius Black will have a different date every Hogsmeade trip as surely as Lily Evans will turn down James Potter the next time he asks her out.

Lily tells James she would rather go out with the giant squid, not for the first time, and Professor Sprout pairs her and Sirius together in a herbology thing. They have to spend a couple weeks working together, and Sirius learns that she isn't all fiery hair and attitude and pure nerdiness. She's soft and gentle, and so, so patient. She laughs at his jokes, but only when they're funny.

James shoots them betrayed glares from across the room, where he's partnered with Dorcas Meadowes.

They let the schools supply of Cornish Pixies free, and classes are cancelled for two days while Filch tries to catch them all. They set off a stink bomb in Slughorn's office, and he spends the rest of the year giving them low marks in Potions to make up for it.

They finish the map, and James' dad gives him an invisibility cloak for his birthday. They start exploring the castle at night, and it's on one of the (many) drunken evenings on the top of the Astronomy tower that Remus decides the map should be able to tell you where everyone is all the time (they spent an hour trying to track down Peter, earlier, only to find that he'd been in the kitchens the entire time).

Sirius watches James slowly begin to realise that he doesn't have a thing for _ginger_ girls, he has a thing for _Lily Evans._ Remus watches Sirius realise that he's not quite alone, anymore. Peter finds the radio that only plays _Queen,_ one evening in December, and they sing along loudly to every song that comes up because they know them _all_ by now.

The first muggles get killed just after the new year, and the entirety of Hogwarts mourns for the loss of peace for the first time in nearly a hundred years in the Wizarding World.

Regulus walks in silence beside Sirius from the train station to their house in the summer, and Sirius has so much he wants to say, but he knows he'll never be able to say it to ears that are willing to listen.

Sirius' parents think that 'this Voldemort fellow has the right idea', and Regulus only hesitates for a second before he agrees. Sirius wants to be sick. He goes back to school with a bruise above his right eyebrow. Not from his mother, but from his brother. Sirius goes back to school without a family, and as he watches Grimmauld place fade into the distance, he thinks it might be the last time he'll ever see it.

Fifth year is the year everything starts to fall into place.

On the 22nd of October, he turns into a dog for the first time. That same month, they accompany Remus on his first full moon with company. He's never felt such exhilaration, or free as when he's running through the forbidden forest with a stag to his left and a wolf to his right, and a rat perched on one of their shoulders.

He suddenly _understands_ charms, and is able to do all sorts of useful things. He charms James' glasses to turn black at four o'clock every day and it takes James a week- and Remus' help- to figure out to get it to stop.

Lily Evan's heart breaks and its partly Sirius' fault, but it's mostly the arsehole she calls a best friend's, and Sirius holds her while she cries and takes her to the kitchen to get ice cream. She screams at him for being involved, and Sirius just nods, because he _knows_ that it's his fault for pushing Snivellus to the point where he said it.

She eats ice cream and tells him about her sister, and he tells her about her brother. They share a family history of being a _freak,_ and it's not a steady foundation for friendship, but their sense of humour and ability to beat everyone else at Wizard Chess is, and suddenly, Sirius has four eyes he searches for when he first walks into the room.

He starts to see why James is- even though he won't admit it- starting to fall in love with her.

James gets him tickets to see Queen for Christmas, and Remus and Peter get him a leather jacket between them, and Sirius never takes it off. It sits nicely under his cloak, and in the summer, he slings it over his shoulder. Marlene looks at him twice, and Sirius tosses wink after wink over his shoulder. He's _cool,_ and he knows it.

He laughs too much and realises that the family he lost when he was eleven wasn't anywhere near as good as the one has now.

But underneath everything is still the same burning sensation that he had a family, once, who he wasn't good enough for, and this family might just decide the same thing.

He moves in with James Potter that summer, and they treat him like another son.

It wasn't even a question, when he walked out of the house, head held high and nobody running after him. He walks past Regulus on the stairs, and Regulus quietly asks him _where will you go?_ And Sirius shrugs, and mutters _home_ , and Regulus looks so so so confused, but it's simple, Reg, because home isn't always a place. It's people and a mindset and something that they've never ever had.

Sirius wakes up in the early morning on Mrs Potter's birthday with James, even though it's a Saturday and neither of them want to be awake, and make her breakfast in bed with the help of Winnerta-the-house-elf- who actually knows how to smile, unlike Kreacher- and she laughs and says she couldn't ask for better _sons._

Sirius hides his smile, biting it down but it's there and blossoming and its warm in his stomach. Mr Potter shows him how to fix cars up, a little side hobby of his, and Sirius watches, enraptured, and so confused as to why James never got into this. He learns charms to make them fly, and spells to make them move faster and, at the end of the summer, he's told he's a natural.

If it weren't for the war, Sirius decides he would have been a mechanic.

Remus and Peter come and stay for a week, and Mrs Potter teases them about being unable to live without each other and Sirius looks at the faces of his three brothers and thinks that she's really not that far off. Peter's dyed his hair blue and it looks _so_ ridiculous that they just have to make fun of him every chance they get. Remus slyly shoots some spell at it that makes it change colour slowly, so he looks like one of those muggle Christmas trees, with the ever-changing colours.

The Gryffindor girls- or the cool ones, anyway- come to visit. It's the first time the eight of them have met up over the summer. It's _weird._ The bottle of firewhisky goes down a lot quicker than it does with just the four of them, but then, there's also bottles of wine and muggle alcohol that makes Sirius flinch.

They get spectacularly drunk, lying on the lawn outside James' house. Lily throws her bottle into the air and declares that this is going to be the best year yet, sixth year. Sirius looks over and laughs. She's a mess, ginger hair thrown all over the place, with leaves tangled into its masses, and her nail varnish is chipped and he looks past her to James, and James is watching her with that expression, and Sirius just _knows_ that they're going to have something beautiful.

Marlene's laugh is loud and cheerful, and it makes everything else seem like it's going to fade away. Her hair is long and black and her lipstick is red and she goes so, so well with his leather jacket. Dorcas is leaning against Mary, bottle of wine in one hand and they're both singing loudly along to some song that Sirius is sure he'd recognise if he were sober. Remus is flat on his back, looking up at the sky, and Peter's hair is still stupidly blue but it looks okay now that he's a bit drunk. Maybe Sirius should dye his blue, to match.

Sixth year starts and all they know is stress. Lily and Remus have prefect patrol every Tuesday night, and they suddenly become best friends.

They haven't even been back at school for three weeks when she figures out he's werewolf. Remus cries on Sirius' shoulder in their dorm until Lily storms in and tells him to stop being stupid, she's known since first year and he's the best person she knows now would he _please_ stop crying because they're late as it is for their meeting. Remus sort of blinks, and Sirius feels so _grateful_ for Evans that he forgets he's supposed to be annoyed because she enchanted his shoes to dance whenever he put them on last week.

Life returns to normal. Sirius hexes- but only when Lily's not around- Snape whenever he sees him, and Snape hexes Sirius and James. James falls off his broom in quidditch, and ends up on crutches for a couple months because Madame don't-call-me-Polly Pomfrey tells him that she won't fix it. It'll teach him not to dance on his broom when he's a thousand feet up just to impress the pretty girls in the crowd. James blushes and Sirius laughs.

Peter is the only one that tries to help James when he's a cripple. Sirius nicks his crutches and enchants one so he can have jousting matches with the other. Remus watches from the sidelines, lines tired on his face, but even he can't hide his smile. James scowls, and fixes his glasses so they're not askew and shouts curses at Sirius.

Eventually, Poppy takes pity on him, and gives him skelgrow to fix himself.

The first thing James does is tie Sirius to his mattress and fly it out to the Lake, where he leaves it to float until morning.

He gets sent an old, golden watch for his seventeenth birthday, and he doesn't cry when he gets it. It's signed _with love._

He beats Peter at exploding snap for the first time since year seven, and doesn't shut up about it for a week. He gets an _O_ in charms for the first time since _ever._ But the most important _for the first time,_ is the one where he looks forward to going home for Christmas.

He wakes up Christmas morning to a voucher underneath the Christmas tree, for a second hand motorbike shop that's in the next town over from the Potter's house. Mr Potter winks at him and Sirius has never felt happier.

He returns to school with a grin on his face, and to the news that his baby brother- his real one- has become a death eater. Remus has to hold him back from punching Snape square on the nose when he breaks the news to them in Potions.

Sirius pretends he's fine, but he spends the evening as a black dog, roaming around the forbidden forest. He doesn't explicitly go out in search of something that would do him great damage, but he doesn't stay away from it either. From that point on, there's only a small part of Sirius that actually cares about his physical wellbeing. He's reckless and rude and he just doesn't care.

He barely passes the year, and it's only because of Remus kicking his arse into gear that he does. James takes him out to the motor shop the day after they return from Hogwarts and he buys some old Harley model. Over the summer, he spends at least two hours every day in the Potter's garage working on it with his music turned up too loud.

James asks him twice a day if he's okay, and every time Sirius nods, and every time it's a lie.

More people die, and every time Sirius checks for his brother's name. First in the list of the dead, and second in the list of those caught.

 _Do you think we'll make it?_ James asks him one night, beer on his breath.

 _I like to think we have what it takes to make it out of this alive._ Sirius replies, and he hopes it's true more than anything.

James gets head boy, and Sirius teases him a suitable amount. James is convinced it's some sort of elaborate prank that Sirius has somehow managed to get Dumbledore in on until they're boarding the train and Moony _still_ hasn't put on the Head Boy badge. Lily makes Head Girl, and James complains and complains, but secretly (very obviously and not secret at all) he's glad.

Within the first week back at school, the death eaters try to recruit Sirius.

He doesn't know if it's stupid or scary that they don't even care that people know who they are. Either way, he point blank tells them _no,_ and from then on, he forcefully doesn't look for Regulus' name in either of the lists. He doesn't _care_ he tells himself.

Lily and James get closer and closer. They go for walks around the lake, and James throws his arms around her shoulders, and Remus watches them from the window, and Sirius questions whether they or not they know they're dating. Peter laughs from his spot on the bed, like it's funny but it's not. Sirius watches as Lily starts falling just as deeply as James fell for her.

James kisses Lily one evening, by the fire. She kisses him back, and then gets all embarrassed and leaves. She confesses to Sirius later- he's the one that finds her in the kitchens, a bowl of apple pie and ice cream on her lap- that she doesn't know if James likes her back, or if he likes her because she's always rejected him.

Sirius tells her not to be stupid, and forces them into a broom closet together after a week of awkward silence. Remus lets them out three hours later. They're holding hands and Lily has a love bite on her neck, and James' buttons are done up wrong. The first thing Lily does is through a hex at Sirius, and the second is she throws her arms around his neck to whisper _thank you_ in his ear.

They're disgusting but Sirius is their biggest fan.

Remus watches him with an amused expression as he slowly begins to recover the youthful joy he lost following Regulus' abandonment of everything that's good.

Sirius leans on Remus and Peter and James and he slowly begins to feel himself forget that he's _forcing_ a smile. By Christmas, he's not forcing it anymore at all.

He takes a picture of James swinging Lily round in the snow. They're both laughing and Lily's head is tipped back, joy bursting out of her. He keeps it for himself, to remind him that there is happiness, and he will find it. He's pretty sure Remus sees him slip into one of his textbooks, but he doesn't say anything more than a raised eyebrow and a curious glance.

 _He's wise, is our Remus._

They all club together and get him a new trunk for Christmas, an expensive one. He's always wanted to be a teacher, they've known that for as long as they've known Moony, but he's also always managed to come up with an excuse of why he _shouldn't_ be.

They write _Professor R.J Lupin_ on it in a fancy font and hide chocolate in it, and random notes with stupid jokes on for him to find five, ten years down the line.

They spend Christmas day together, at Hogwarts, because the world outside is 'too dangerous'. It's the first year Sirius has known Hogwarts to be as busy during the holidays as it is during the school year.

Marlene's parents appear on the list of the dead on the second of January.

Sirius' second-cousin by marriage (the one his Mother loves) appears in the list of those captured.

Dorcas' brother, and her sister, appear on the ninth.

James' parents appear on the twenty-first.

Sirius loses a family for the second time in seven years, and this time it hurts more, but it also hurts less.

It hurts less because he's done it before, and he knows what it's like. It hurts less, because he can curl up as Padfoot, and James will be right there beside him. He's not alone, this time.

It hurts more, because this time there's no chance of forgiveness.

James doesn't smile for a week. He clutches Lily's hand tighter than ever, and he pulls Sirius in for hugs that last a beat and a half too long. He squeezes Remus too hard when he hugs him, and he no longer ribs Peter for staring after Lydia Denwood.

James is left two houses, and a shit ton of money and he doesn't want any of it.

Dorcas wakes up screaming in the middle of the night that all she wants is her family back, and slowly, one by one, a group of teenagers begin to turn into soldiers.

Lily takes them all to Petunia's wedding, and Sirius only stops looking over his shoulder for death eaters when he's had a bottle of wine to himself. Dorcas dances with Remus on the dance floor, holding him tight, and Remus' eyes close slowly. He kisses the top of her head, and Sirius' heart shatters.

Lily and James dance and Sirius' heart shatters.

He dances with Marlene and his heart shatters.

None of them realise that it's not going to last. This little bubble that they've built their entire worlds on _isn't going to last._ It's going to pop and everything is going to collapse.

But it's okay.

It's okay because Vernon Dudley is a proper little prick. He looks more like he's purple than he's pink, and Lily's parents are lovely. It's okay because Remus is laughing at Peter's hair, which now matches Vernon's face. It's okay because James is looking at Lily like the world could end and they'd be fine.

It's okay because for a collapsing bubble, there's an awful lot of love.

It's okay, because Marlene has her head on his chest, and Peter's waltzing some stupid waltz with Mary but they're laughing too hard for it to be any good.

None of its going to last, but it's okay. It's okay, for now.

They leave Hogwarts in the summer, and James and Lily move in together. He asks her after he's won the final quidditch match of the year, and therefore the cup. She nods, and he picks her up and swings her round.

They use some of his parent's money to buy a small flat in London.

Sirius visits every Friday night, and Remus stays once a month. Peter has his own mug, and between the five of them, that tiny flat is home.

One night, Lily comes running with the news that Arthur Weasley from work ( _he eloped with his wife, Molly, don't you know, James)_ wanted her to babysit the twins and their various other children and Sirius only knows of the Weasley's because his mother's blasted them off of the family tree, but he laughs anyway. James looks at Lily, and ten seconds later, he drags Sirius out the room to ask _what do you think about marriage?_

Sirius tells him it's a load of crap, but it's the sort of crap that him and Lily would do splendidly together.

James proposes without a ring and with a shitty speech two days later. Lily got home from work late- she'd been attacked on the way home by death eaters. Her legs collapsed from under her, and there's blood bursting from every vein in her body.

She's lucky Remus had come over a day early and somehow knew the counter-spell to every single curse she'd been attacked with. The second she opens her eyes James means to say _are you okay?_ But he says _marry me, Evans._

Lily means to say _ow,_ but she says _yes._

They get married in spring, 1979. It's blossoming, and by some obscure miracle, it doesn't rain. The ceremony takes place in some small church near where James grew up, and they have the reception on his front lawn outside his parent's old house. Mr and Mrs Weasley come, five children- Sirius thinks, anyway. He might just be counting the same child five times; they all look so similar- in tow.

Remus spends an hour blowing bubbles out of the end of his want, and the twins wave their chubby arms about, trying to catch them. Sirius spends the same hour watching James stress about marrying Lily.

Eventually, though, Sirius gets him to the end of the aisle, and James doesn't seem to care too much about his past stresses when Lily starts walking. She looks good, Sirius will give her that. She has some sort of flower in her hair, holding it back, and the dress is long and white and delicate-looking, and Sirius imagines every bride wants to look like Lily on their wedding day.

Sirius winks at her as she takes her place next to James, and she winks back.

The reception is beautiful. James had planned it so, naturally, as many people as humanely possibly had come. The aim, James had whispered to Sirius when Lily wasn't listening, was to upstage Petunia's wedding. Sirius, having met Lily's sister and brother-in-law, had wholeheartedly agreed.

Most of the Order of the Phoenix showed up, with a varying degree of presents. Dumbledore appeared with McGonagall by his side, and announced to everyone within a ten foot radius that it was he who had known all along they'd get together. Lily followed James around, being introduced to different people and no doubt forgetting all their names the second they left.

She threw cake at James' face and Sirius had, as the wonderful best man he was, helped her. James rubbed his face against hers, leaving a long smear of icing down her cheek, and then licked off. Lily shrieks and Sirius winces, but it's so _light._

For a minute, the entire world stands still.

Lily and James look at each other, and they're smiling that god-awful smile they save only for each other and the world doesn't move.

The ministry of magic stops all its work and the Death eaters don't matter anymore. Voldemort is a threat that doesn't exist in this exact moment. All that matters is Arthur Weasely trying to force-feed Fred (or George, Sirius isn't sure) cake, and Alice catching the Bouquet- Lily winks at Frank like they're in on some secret together- and Remus pulling flowers out of his hair (Sirius hides his snort in his hand) and Mary spinning round and round on the dance floor.

The world stands still for Lily and James Potter.

They don't go on a honey moon, but instead return to their tiny flat in East London. Sirius still goes round once a week, Peter's mug doesn't move from its shelf and Remus still sleeps over once a month.

Nothing changes but Lily's surname.

Sirius spends his time divided between Marlene Mckinnon with her long black hair and her throaty laugh, and fighting Voldemort.

He's grabbing some last minute shopping with Marlene the first time he's attacked by his brother. They're swinging their hands between them, and the first death eater strikes, and Marlene's gone before he can even call her name.

It wasn't Regulus that did it. It wasn't, it wasn't, it wasn't.

(But it could have been.)

He apparates to James' couch and Lily's there reading a book with their cat- it's called Mouse for some obscure reason Sirius will never understand- curled up on her lap. There's a glass of wine in her hand, and she drops it in surprise. It stains their carpet, but she doesn't notice.

The book is thrown to the side, and she's holding him, head cradled to her chest as she rocks him gently back and forth. He's sobbing and he can't get the words out right.

Marlene had long black hair, and she was alive. She made Sirius forget that there was a war on. She was like him, only she had never been broken and Sirius _loved_ that. He loved that she was always smiling, and that she felt everything so _strongly._ She was loud, and she loved like she lived. Laughing and always, always full of something.

The thing is, Marlene was also Lily's best friend.

By the time Sirius has calmed down enough to tell her, Lily's figured it out.

James comes home to find them both a sobbing mess on his sofa, Mouse curled up tightly between them and he throws his arm round his wife and the other one round his best mate and just sighs.

Marlene wasn't his family, Sirius knows that. She wasn't his family, but it hurts like she was.

There's a war on, so Sirius moves on. He drinks and he cries into his pillow at night, and he can hear Remus doing to the same in the next room over. He drinks and he cries, and he goes to work and he doesn't sleep.

Sirius moves on because the rest of the world needs him to.

Lily cries when she finds out she's pregnant. She holds Sirius close and murmurs that she's not ready to have a baby. She hits James and tells him that only he would be able to get someone pregnant in the middle of a bloody war. Sirius laughs and James has never looked so happy, and Sirius realises it's like a cycle. Something bad happens, and then something good. Something good to make him forget about the bad.

Lily and James are attacked two weeks after they tell the order about the baby inside of Lily. They're walking home, and the deatheaters swoop in. Lily apparates straight away, too concerned for the baby inside of her to stay and fight, but not before they get her. There's a scar, now, on the back of her neck from the time she didn't stay and fight. It's in the shape of a circle, like a bullet wound.

Sirius hears the news the following day, and he goes straight round to see them. James' hand is still shaking from the body-binding curse, and his hair is more blood than it is hair, but they're alive and that's all that matters.

Four weeks and two death eater attacks later, Dumbledore pulls them aside and tells them about the prophecy. James gets spectacularly drunk, and Lily shuts herself off from the world. James tells Sirius, Peter and Remus at the same time. Lily had sent a patronus to Sirius asking if they'd seen him, and he apparates over. The three marauders spent the next four hours trying to find him, and when they do (he's sitting in the shrieking shack in _Hogsmeade_ of all places), he tells them everything.

There's a prophecy, as far as Sirius understands it. A boy- supposedly, it means Lily and James' boy- will destroy Voldemort. And this means that they have to go into hiding because he's coming after them.

Sirius hasn't seen Peter in a month, but he doesn't think anything of it because they're in a war, and people are busy.

Eight months later, he's a godfather.

His name is Harry James Potter, and he has Lily's eyes, and his father's dark black hair and crappy eyesight. He giggles and clutches onto Sirius' hair and Sirius has tears in his eyes and it's not because he hates children like he tells them it is, it's because this is the best thing that's ever happened to him.

Remus buys him too many toys, enough that they can fill half his room with them. Sirius' favourite picture of Harry from his first couple weeks is Harry buried amongst all the toys. You can barely see the black tufts of his hair.

Peter brings him food. Lily tells him time and time again that Harry won't be able to eat solids for a while, but Peter doesn't seem to care. Sirius watches from his spot on the counter top of their new house in Godric's Hollow- it's a lot nicer than the old one- and laughs as Peter brings in another cake, or another lasagne.

Sirius and Remus watch Harry for Lily and James every other Thursday night, so they can have a nights rest. They invite Peter to come, but he's always busy at work, or something. Sirius doesn't pry. They try teaching him to walk and run and Sirius makes him laugh by turning into a dog and licking Harry. Remus scolds him because apparently it's unhygienic, but he doesn't care.

They're still fighting a war, though, and it never hits harder than when they lose Mary, Dorcas, and Terry Jason from the house two doors down all in one night. Four nights later, Sirius gets the news that Regulus was killed some time the year before, and they've only just discovered it now. The circumstances are suspicious, and it was likely he was killed by other deatheaters as nobody had come forward, but Sirius doesn't think too long on it.

He has a new family now, with James and Lily, and Peter and Remus. So he clutches Harry closer and doesn't respond to the patronus. Instead, he rests Harry gently on his chest, and lies back to sleep on the Potter's couch.

They stay in for Christmas. Lily makes a roast Chicken- James doesn't like Turkey, the fussy bugger- and they draw on Remus' face when he falls asleep on the floor after eating too much apple pie. He wakes up with four dicks drawn on his face, and Lily's more annoyed than he is. They're eating leftovers for a week while Harry learns to crawl.

Sirius takes another photo, new years day, 1981.

James and Lily are standing by Harry's bed, looking down at him. Lily rests her head on James' shoulder, and James slides his hand round her waist.

Sirius swallows, and it's tight. He blinks, and it's like its Marlene, there, with his hand round her waist and her head on his shoulder.

He blinks, and it's gone.

Ten months later, he blinks again, and it's gone.

He's the Potter's secret keeper, see. He gets attacked every week by death eaters trying to get information out of him, and every time he manages to escape within an inch of his life. Once, he's bleeding so much he faints the second he apparates into his shared flat with Remus. Remus manages to patch him back together again, but he walks with a limp for the next month.

Once a month, Sirius turns into a dog and runs through the forest behind Godric's Hollow with a wolf on his left, and a stag on his right, a rat perched on his back. He tries to teach Harry how to say _Padfoot,_ or _uncle Sirius,_ or even just _Sirius_ but he never gets the hang of it. Moony manages to teach him to say _Moo,_ but Sirius adamantly protests that that's only because he saw a cow.

They're so _good._ They're Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs and they know each other like the back of their hands. They're brothers and they send more time fighting than they do laughing. Sirius thinks, one night, with Harry in his arms and Lily asleep on the sofa beside him, James' head in her lap, that this isn't how they should be spending their twenties. They're living like the world is going to collapse any day, when it should last forever.

This is ten months later, and it's not okay.

He spends the morning of Halloween with Remus. Remus has a broken leg and going to St. Mungos is too dangerous, so he's wincing with every movement. Sirius gives him some skelgrow that Lily slipped them from a batch at work, but their supply is dwindling dangerously low. He throws a pumpkin outside the house- it has a sloppily drawn angry face on it that Lily had dropped round during the week- and sticks a basket of sweets by the door.

The night draws in quicker than usual. Sirius flicks through an old photo album he found when sorting out a box from his move from the Potter's. It's an old one, from first year and he stares at each photo for too long, before showing them to Remus. Remus points out Sirius' short hair and lets out a pained chuckle, and Sirius notices that Remus' eyes weren't always as tight as they are now.

They laugh at one of James throwing his hair back, with a barely-visible Lily in the background looking at him disdainfully. There's one of all four of them, sat in their dorm and Sirius doesn't remember _how_ they took the photo but he's glad they did. He rubs his thumb over it to smooth the dust off, and smiles. The word crosses his mind before he can react, and he's glad. _Family._

It's five to four, and Lily and James are having a quiet night in with Harry.

It's quarter to five After a week of dodging Death Eaters every few steps, they're too exhausted to do much more.

It's half past six Sirius flops on the floor beside the couch with Remus on, and lifts a hand to his face.

It's twelve minutes past seven, and Sirius Black has no family.

He's standing outside the Potter's house, staring up at it with blank eyes and an empty heart. He'd gone out for a walk, gone stir crazy sitting in the apartment with only Remus and his _bloody_ broken leg for company, and he'd received a patronus. Dumbledore's slow, rumbling voice spoke out and shattered Sirius' entire life.

Sirius stares at the house and he doesn't see the ruins, he sees a wife, a husband and a baby who were beginning their life together. He looks at the house and doesn't see what the rest of the world is seeing- Voldemort is dead- but sees a house where his best friend, his _brother,_ lived.

Sirius stares at the path to house, and sees Harry taking his first steps. He stares at the door, and sees James knock Lily's head on it as he tries to carry her through. He looks at the window and sees Lily waving Harry's chubby arm at him as he leaves. He looks at the flowers surrounding the garden and sees Remus helping James plant them. He looks at the grass and sees Peter lying on his back, smoke billowing out of his mouth as he laughs at Remus.

He looks at the house and sees his family.

But then, he looks at the house and sees Peter in every nook and cranny.

Sirius looks at the house and sees everything that he used to have that was taken away from him.

It's easier to write about love than it is to write about pain, but when pain is all you know, it's all you can write.

The last time Sirius was there, he was laughing. James was flying Harry round the room on the broomstick Sirius got Harry for his birthday, and James was promising Harry the world. According to James, Harry was going to be the next greatest Chaser the world has ever seen- taking after his father. Lily was cutting Remus' hair by the sink, and shouting in to them to watch out for the vases. Sirius was laughing and he doesn't remember why because laughing didn't seem like it was so important then. You never think the last time is going to be the last. You think you have forever, but you don't.

Sirius stares at the house and _wishes_ he could remember why he laughed.

It's then that he hears the baby's cry, that he sees Hagrid emerge from the smoking building, Harry in his arms. Sirius feels like laughing all over again, but then he realises that baby Harry is going to grow up an orphan.

 _Let me take him, Hagrid._

 _I'm his godfather, let me._

And Hagrid says no because he's got his orders from Dumbledore and Sirius is too young, and too distraught but what everybody bloody forgets is that Sirius is a soldier. He's lost every family he's had since he was a baby and he doesn't want to lose this one too. He's _not_ going to lose this one too.

Sirius holds his arms out for Harry, and Hagrid reluctantly hands him to Sirius, eyes unsure but calm and secure like they always are. Sirius stares down at Harry's- _Lily's-_ green eyes and Harry's- _James'-_ dark brown messy hair, and smoothes his thumb over the jagged red mark on his forehead that wasn't there yesterday.

There isn't an aspect of Harry that belongs solely to Harry. He's Lily and James.

 _Please, Hagrid, I promise I'll look after him._

Only it doesn't sound like that because he's crying.

Sirius watches Hagrid take Harry back, kick off the motorbike that Sirius offers him so that he can get to safety faster, and then drops to the floor. He leans against James' front door and just stares at the gate, wondering how it was that this _happened._

Peter.

And then he's not sad, so much as blindly angry. Furious. He wants to _destroy_ something. He wants to blame something for all of this pain and loss inside of him and the only person he can think of doing it to is Peter.

Because it was, really, wasn't it. It was Peter.

Peter who Sirius called _Pete, Wormy, Wormtail,_ and _ratface._ Peter who Sirius used to sneak to the kitchens with when he was bored and Peter was hungry. Peter who showed Sirius the best way to eat pizza. Peter who introduced Sirius to coffee. Peter who laughed at Sirius' jokes, and Peter who was the first to forgive him when he nearly killed Snape. Peter that Sirius threw himself in front of to stop that Davey Mosely twat from cursing during a duel in fourth year.

Peter who betrayed Lily and James.

Peter who orphaned Harry Potter.

Sirius goes after him, tries to kill him and fails.

Sirius goes to Azkaban and doesn't come out for twelve years.

The night the rest of the world celebrates Sirius Black stares up at the moon and wishes he were running through the forest, a stag on one side and a wolf on another.

Sirius Black watches twelve years pass and it feels like nothing because, deep down, he knows that it's his fault. He knows it. He doesn't think it, because there isn't any doubt in his mind.

He looks up at the full moon every month and sees a stag and a doe.

And it's his fault.

 _Do you know_

 _how often_

 _I speak to you_

 _when you are not  
here? _

_How often_

 _I_

 _Mouth words and phrases_

 _To the space you should be filling?_


End file.
